Wisky For The Men

A novelist joins his ancestor on a trip West and discovers in her daily travails an intimate view of a tremendous national migration

We know that the Marvins had, at the very least, three children: the baby; Billy, whose pantaloons she mended; and Narcissa. There were probably others. But if we use the figure three as an average and calculate that by now children have been generated seven times, the diarist might have 6,561 three-times-great grandchildren around by now, with 19,683 the next figure in the sequence, and 59,049 by the two hundredth anniversary of the journey. Hi, cousins.